Game Design

A meme of the Proclaimers from the "I'm Gonna Be" Music video that reads, "And I will write 500 words, and I will write 500 more."

Designing for New Systems

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Check out Burn Bryte, an original science fantasy TTRPG I helped create for Roll20!

Though I started by my game design career creating content for fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons, over the years I’ve worked with other games like CAPERS, City of Mist, and ZWEIHÄNDER.

Why Write for Other Games?

I love Dungeons & Dragons and plan to continue my design work in this area, but I also enjoy MANY other roleplaying games. I want to write for other games. That desire drives me to seek out gigs outside of Dungeons & Dragons naturally.Even if you don’t want to write for a game other than your chosen favorite, it’s not a bad idea to try your hand at another system. Most game designers can find more than one RPG that floats their boat, and as discussed in a previous post, reading and playing other games makes you a better creator in your chosen system. You likely have another game you already like. It should be easy to find at least one other you’d be interested in designing for! Just like reading other games sharpens your design skills, working on other games does the same. There’s one other reason to try designing another game. Odds are your chosen system won’t be around forever. There are big mechanical and style differences between the third, fourth, and fifth editions of Dungeons & Dragons. Because I know how to analyze and write for a new game, I’ll be ready to rock and roll when the sixth edition of D&D comes out (hopefully not for a very long time, but still).

Getting the Contract

When you’re ready to write for another game, figure out your chosen system then decide how you plan to work on that game. Does this system have an open gaming or similar license that allows you to publish on your own? Do they have submission guidelines on their website that could allow you to work directly with them? Do they have a community content marketplace (like the Dungeon Masters Guild) that allows you access to their IP? Do you know the game’s publisher and can you approach them with an idea directly? Hopefully the answer to at least one of these questions is yes. If more than one answer is yes, congratulations! You have options. Pick the path that is best for the product and you.

Preparing to Design

Once you have an idea of what you’re going to make, you should get familiar with the system and get to know your design team.

Make it Clear You’re a First-Timer

Whether you’re working with the publisher of the game or a team you assembled yourself, prepare the people you’re working with by telling them this is your first time working with this system. They will understand you might need a little more time to wrap your brain around the game. If you’re working with the publisher they should also send you a free copy of the game’s core rules at the very least. Ask for this if they do not offer and you don’t already have it. Get a style guide too!

Read the Core Rules and Style Guide

Even if you’ve read the game’s rules before, read them again before you dive into designing. If you haven’t read them before, get on it. You should be an active reader, taking note not just of mechanics, but also of the voice and style of writing. How does this game present and break down information? Make notes, especially in ways this game is different from the one you design for most. Oxford comma? Boxed text? Tables? Typical formatting of basic check/save/roll/draw/etc.? If you’re working with a publisher, they should have a style guide for you. If you’re not working with them, there might be one available for free on their website or marketplace somewhere. Read this too! It tells you how to write for their game. Eat it up with a brain spoon.

Read Template Products…A Lot

After you read the core rules and style guide, read a version of the thing you want to create. Are you writing an adventure? Read lots of those for the system you’re creating. A monster book? Devour those stat blocks. A rules supplement? You get the idea.Not only will studying template products help you better understand the game’s voice and style, it will also help you learn what already exists in the world of the game. You might have a great idea for an adventure, but if someone else has already written something similar, you now know you’re better off going with plan B.

Play the Game

Reading a game helps us understand the laws that govern its mechanics, style, and voice. Playing the game helps bend and break those laws while still staying true to the game. You must play the games you wish to design for to fully understand them and get an idea of how they flow at the table. You should play the game for the same reason products should be playtested. What’s on paper isn’t always what plays out at the table.

Work with a Veteran of the System

If you’re not working directly with the publisher, enlist the help of a codesigner or development editor who has worked with the system before. This person is your guardian angel who can give advice and help fix mistakes folx familiar with the system will pickup on right away.

Designing

All that prep work is great, but you’ve only just begun. Keep these things in mind when designing.

Communicate

Be it the publisher or a veteran editor you hire yourself, make sure you communicate early and often with system experts. If you can’t find an answer by looking in the game’s rules or from another trustworthy source, ask your expert! Don’t guess at mechanics and style if you don’t have to!I would also send work sooner rather than later for your expert to check. If you’re making a book of twenty monsters, send the first critter to your expert before proceeding rather than sending the entire rough draft at one time. For an adventure send the first encounter before writing many more. You might be making some mistakes that are simple to fix in one place but a pain in the butt to fix in twenty (and if it’s a pain in the butt to fix in one, it’s nigh impossible to fix in twenty). Your publisher, editor, etc. can catch that. Make sure you keep up the communication! Send monsters/encounters/chapters/etc. one-at-a-time until you feel ready to rock.

Don’t Know? Check

Don’t be lazy! If you are unsure of style or mechanics, don’t take a best guess. Look it up in the rules. It will make you write a little slower, but your editor and you will save time in the end. Don’t rely on your memory. Odds are you have so many game rules in there, you’ll pull out something incorrect at some point. Always look it up when in doubt.

Keep Playing

While you design, keep playing your chosen game. In fact you should play with the things you designed (provided it’s ok with the publisher). You’ll do your own first round of playtesting, which leads to a much better first draft.Even if you can’t playtest what you’re writing, keep playing the game until your product is finished at the very least. You’ll better understand the system with every throw of the dice (or draw of the cards or pull of the brick or… you get the idea).

If you like what you’re reading, please follow me on Twitter, like World Builder Blog on Facebook, sign up for my mailing list, find my products on the DMs Guild and DriveThruRPG, tell your friends about the blog, and/or leave me a comment and let me know you think. Thanks!

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Make the Thing You Want to Make

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Check out Burn Bryte, an original science fantasy TTRPG I helped create for Roll20!

For the last several years I’ve gotten messages from designers describing a product they plan to create then asking if I think the project will sell well and grab the attention of big publishers like Wizards of the Coast. My response is always this question, “Is this product something you are excited about and would buy yourself?” If the answer is no, even if it is something you are sure will sell a million copies, don’t make it. Your reputation depends on it, and if you end up making something you wouldn’t marry, you may grab the attention of big publishers in a bad way. Plus it won’t be fun or fulfilling for you, which is kind of the point!

Passion is Everything 

Let’s face it. Most of us didn’t get into the RPG design industry to get rich. Though RPGs are growing, it’s still an industry that makes less than many other forms of entertainment. We get into this stuff because we love it. If you start to make products you aren’t 100% all-in on, you’ll start to resent ever wanting to make RPGs. There’s already a lot of reasons to resent the work (long hours, little pay, and internet trolls to name a few). You shouldn’t give yourself more.Passion for your work is more than just avoiding resenting your work. It is a motivator, a tool that helps push your work forward, makes it better, and helps it sell.

Carries the Work

If you are excited about a project, it is far easier for you to sit down each day and actually write, playtest, edit, and do anything else related to the project. When you care about the work, you actually sit down and do it. For many people, RPG design comes second to other work, family, social, and life commitments. You’re cutting into relaxation time to get it done, so make sure you care enough about what you’re making that it’s worth it to not watch the latest episode of The Mandalorian right when it drops. Many, many, many RPG products never see the light of day because their creators don’t believe in the project enough to get it finished. If you like the product, you’ll still have to work hard, but at least you’ll enjoy the work more.

Makes the Work Thorough

Passion doesn’t just help ensure your work gets finished. It ensures your work is done thoroughly. If you don’t have the passion for a project, you might skip that final revision pass, a playtest, or some other aspect just to get the project done and off your desk. You want anything you put out to be done right, not just done. If you don’t care about the work, it can get sloppy, which hurts sales and your reputation as a designer.

Informs the Work

Ever pick up a book or sit down to watch something and think, “This isn’t going to be for me,” only to be a huge fan of the property five minutes in? It’s because the people who made that art cared about it so much, their enthusiasm got you on board. They weren’t just making something to sell or advance their own career. They were so excited about the Civil War (or whatever) that you got on board with them. The same is true for you. When you are excited about the products you make, that comes across in the work and makes it more engaging. You want the audience to love what you love. It’s part of being a nerd!My first RPG product for another publisher, my first paid work, was Give Chase, an article for EN5ider that gave advice about creating and running chases in fifth edition D&D. No one was asking for that, but I felt strongly about the material. That came across in my pitch, which I took me a while to write and revise. James Haeck took a chance on me, and the rest is history.

Easier to Market

No secret here. RPGs are a small market with a lot of creators. You need to be THE cheerleader for your product on forums, social media, podcasts, etc. If you don’t love the product, you’re going to get sick of talking about it. If you don’t believe in the product, eventually you’ll stop mentioning it. You are your product’s marketing department. Having enthusiasm helps you keep shouting out the message and makes your message genuine.

Makes you Happier

You likely got into designing RPGs because you thought it would be a lot of fun. If you’re working on something you like instead of trying to write something that you think others want, you’re not going to have a great time. Write what you WANT to write. That’s why you got into this to begin with.In conclusion, a project you believe in means better sales, a better product, and a happier you.

If you like what you’re reading, please follow me on Twitter, like World Builder Blog on Facebook, sign up for my mailing list, find my products on the DMs Guild and DriveThruRPG, tell your friends about the blog, and/or leave me a comment and let me know you think. Thanks!

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Read and Play A Lot

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Publisher’s Choice Quality Stock Art © Rich Hershey / Fat Goblin Games

If you like what you’re reading, check out, Burn Bryte, an original science fantasy TTRPG I helped create for Roll20!

I want to write about something many designers, including myself, find important to becoming a pro in the industry: reading and playing lots of games. Roleplaying games in particular if that’s what you’re designing, but you should also read the rules for and play board games, video games, word and number puzzles, and more if you can. It’s important to note that you do not have to read and play a lot of games to be a designer, but it helps a BUNCH if you’re able to do so. Having the time to play and read a lot of games and the money to buy them is not a luxury everyone can afford, and it is much better to jump into design if you’re thinking about it than let these barriers hold you back. If you do have the resources to make reading and playing various games in your life happen, let’s talk about why you should do that and how you might be able to find the time.

I am a busy guy, but I find the time to read new RPG products and board game rules while using a workout machine like a treadmill or elliptical, while on public transportation, and during any other time one might read while multitasking. Similarly, I play new games, including board games and video games, when I am hanging out with friends or at a convention. Not every new game you read or play needs the time commitment of the campaign your weekly game group plays. Simple one-shots with a few friends using the free or cheaper starter set version or rules that never gets played again still has a lot of value for you as a design experience. There are lots of great reasons to read and play as many games as you can.

Better Idea of Design in General

When you experience a lot of games, you get a better of how and why design choices are made. It’s like any other experience. If you watch a lot of basketball, you understand why and when a team might choose to run particular plays, how a player might execute or exploit a specific rule, and all of the little nuances in the sport that a more casual observer may not get. The more games you get to know, the more you become like Neo in the Matrix movies, able to see the ideas and philosophies behind the mechanics of a game that so often get left out of rulebooks. Playing lots of different games sharpens your skills overall and makes you better at designing the game(s) you choose to work on.For instance, let’s say you’re designing a Dungeons & Dragons adventure that is a murder mystery. D&D isn’t designed to be a fully investigative game. It makes things difficult when the characters miss all the clues because they’re rolling poorly. But if you pull some elements from the GUMSHOE system into your adventure, you might have an easier time crafting a fun mystery because you decide when the players fail an ability check to find a clue, they still find something, just not everything they might have found. You may not have had that idea if you never read a GUMSHOE rulebook.

Develop Personal Design Taste

Playing a lot of different games helps you identify what you like and dislike. You’ll be better at making everything from combat encounters to puzzles to narrative-focused games if you spend time getting to know how other games work. You get an idea of the options available to you when you go to design, and you also learn what gaps are out there that you can fill. My blog always does much better numbers when I present an idea that fills in a gap I’ve noticed in a game’s design rather than reinvent a system ten other people already created. Find what you think is missing by reading and playing other games. Odds are other people think it is missing too!

Inspiration (aka Stealing)

There is nothing wrong with taking inspiration from another game! You might adapt the idea of Dungeon World’s fronts for use in Shadowrun. You might use an initiative system inspired by Shadow of the Demon Lord for an RPG about bunnies battling giant ants! Inspiration is a good thing. It has given us incredible, updated editions of our favorite games, and given rise to new masterpieces like Blades in the Dark, which we wouldn’t have without Apocalypse World. The more you read, the more you have to inspire you.

Know Your Options

If you read and play more games, you get an idea of what your options are when it comes time to design. Got an idea for an over-the-top action game? You could design a new system, or it might use FATE or Genesys as its engine with you building the rest of the game on top. Knowing what’s out there gives you tools you can take or reshape. This applies to even parts of a game you are working on. For instance, don’t want create safety tools from scratch for your gritty horror game, but feel like it needs something? Then why not borrow the card system from Burn Bryte (which were inspired by those found in other systems)!

Better Conversations

Knowing what’s out there also helps you better communicate with people in the RPG industry. You get to know the names of prominent creators, you can talk shop with more people in the industry, and you can engage in fun conversations on social media. Knowing your a variety of games truly helps expand your network of friends and professional contacts. Plus it is just fun to talk about games!

It’s Fun

Playing and reading about games is a lot of fun! That’s why we do this, right? If you’re a workaholic like me, you can lose sight of that sometimes. Saying to yourself, “I have to relax and read/play this game to make myself a better designer,” is true, healthy, and a great time. So get out there and start playing!

If you like what you’re reading please consider supporting me on Patreon, supporting me on Ko-fi, follow me on Twitter, like World Builder Blog on Facebook, sign up for my mailing list, find my products on the DMs Guild, tell your friends about the blog, and/or leave me a comment and let me know you think. Thanks!

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Dice

Entice the Players

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Publisher’s Choice Quality Stock Art © Rich Hershey / Fat Goblin Games

If you like what you’re reading, check out, Burn Bryte, an original science fantasy TTRPG I helped create for Roll20!

This post originally appeared on my Patreon a little over a year ago.

While working together on Burn Bryte, my fellow designers and I would talk about how we wanted players to engage with the game. We had an obvious, but often overlooked design philosophy: Reward the players for playing the game a particular way rather than forcing them into it. If you’ve been following World Builder Blog, you about Burn Bryte, a new science fantasy RPG I created with Jim McClure, Kat Kuhl, and Darcy Ross for exclusive use on the Roll20 platform. The game’s core mechanics and character advancement through Story Paths revolve around the idea of designers enticing players to engage with the RPG how you want, instead of forcing the players to play the game a certain way through restrictive rules. I’ll be referring to those posts as examples in this article.

Some Restrictions Are Good

First let me say that I’m not talking about having no restrictions in a game. Most games need parameters, and those restrictions come in the form of rules that describe what the characters’ limitations are. Typically the restrictions you have shouldn’t limit how a character uses their abilities, but rather places a limitation on the power of those abilities. In fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons, a barbarian has a certain number of rages per day, but the rules do not state specific rage-only circumstances for the barbarian. The barbarian can rage in combat, while locked in manacles to get advantage on a Strength check to break free, or while running down a trapped hall to resist damage. The restricted number of rages the barbarian has creates an interesting tension as the player must decide when to use a rage. Many players save these rages for combat encounters, where the feature has the most benefits, thus barbarians are rewarded for using their rage during combat instead of forced to use it only during combat by having a rule that states rages can only be used in combat encounters. It feels good to have a smart choice rewarded instead of being forced into only being able to rage in combat. It’s a subtle but important difference. You can see in this example how restriction and reward work together to create fun in the game.

The Big Idea

In general the fewer restrictions you can put into your game, the better. The expectation with most roleplaying games is that characters can attempt whatever actions their players like. Too much restriction means player characters start to feel locked into a specific mode of play, and the game feels more like a video game (which must have restrictions because of technology) instead of a tabletop game. For instance, some people didn’t enjoy playing fourth edition Dungeons & Dragons because you had player characters with fantastic powers that could only be used as attacks. Take the sword mage class from that edition. It could teleport all over the battlefield, but outside of combat, teleporting was rarely an option. Shouldn’t the guy who acts like Nightcrawler in combat also act like him outside of combat? It broke the immersion for many players and felt too restrictive. The better solution is to reward players for playing the game you want to play and place limits on their features, but not how they use them. For instance, if sword mages could only teleport a certain number of times per day and got a bonus to attack or damage rolls on the same turn they teleport instead of being restricted to only teleporting in combat, you’d likely see many people choosing to save their teleportation uses for combat. Payers would have more freedom and could choose to teleport outside of combat, but the optimal thing to do is wait to use that feature until combat. There’s a big difference between being rewarded for playing a game a certain way and being forced into it.

Reward Risks

Burn Bryte is a science fantasy game, and in the tradition of beloved science fantasy stories (and over-the-top roleplaying game moments) we wanted to encourage characters to take big risks, attempt plans just crazy enough to work, and have unbelievable successes and spectacular failures. You can read more about how we did that in my post about the game’s core mechanics, but I want to specifically address Nova points. Nova points are a resource characters spend to activate their most powerful abilities and are gained when by a player character when they use one skill of each die size (succeed or not). They came about when we asked the question, “How do we prevent player characters from simply using their best skills over and over again?” Jim presented this idea as a way to reward characters for using their less-optimized skills. In playtesting it has worked like a dream.

Roleplaying and Rewards

Many games, like D&D, increase character power through combat and gathering of treasure. In D&D’s rules as written you gain experience by killing monsters, and your stuff gets better when you loot their corpses. There are certainly other ways to play the game, but there’s a reason murder hobos exist. (There’s nothing wrong with wanting to kill dragons and take their treasure. That’s good fun!) If you want your game to play differently, you need to change the way player characters advance. When we were designing Burn Bryte, Kat Kuhl and Darcy Ross pushed for a system that had nonviolent character progression. That’s not to say there isn’t combat in many Burn Bryte games, but there doesn’t need to be in order for your characters to get stronger. They pitched the idea of Story Paths, which take your character through a series of events that could be related to combat, investigation, social interaction, etc. Many of the forty paths that are included in the core rules have options for nonviolent progression. This doesn’t mean their can’t be combat along those paths, but characters who choose the paths are rewarded for actions they take outside of or in addition to combat. Tying character progression to story also changes the game for power gamers. I am at least part power gamer and enjoy my characters’ advancement. Burn Bryte rewards me for engaging with the story, appealing to the power gamer in me AND the storyteller. Our idea is to encourage the power gamers, storytellers, explorers, slayers, and all other kinds of gamers to sit down together and have a great time playing Burn Bryte and engaging with the story. Story Paths reward that.

If you like what you’re reading please consider supporting me on Patreon, supporting me on Ko-fi, follow me on Twitter, like World Builder Blog on Facebook, sign up for my mailing list, find my products on the DMs Guild, tell your friends about the blog, and/or leave me a comment and let me know you think. Thanks!

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Getting Started in Tabletop Roleplaying Game Design

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My latest DMs Guild product, The Iron Titan, is now available!

This post originally appeared on my Patreon page about a year ago.

In the last year the question I’ve received the most about tabletop roleplaying game design is, “How do I get started?” I have more than a little advice to give on that question, so let’s dive in.

Start Small

To get started in game design, you have to sit down and write… but where to start? If you’re like most game designers, you have a head filled with ideas: entirely new game systems, complicated hacks of existing systems, brand new settings, multi-adventure campaigns, and so on. That is awesome. Write down and save every idea you have, because you will likely get to them, but you have to start small. Pick a single element of a game that’s easier to design (like a D&D background or magic item) and challenge yourself to make ONE of those.Why start small? There are several good reasons. The first is that writing for games takes longer and requires more revision than many people initially think. Game design is technical writing, so nailing the the style and jargon of the game you’re designing for is key. If you give yourself less words to write, you’re more likely to finish something that you (and other people) might actually think is good.It’s also true for most people that their first work in game design is not their best. Starting small allows you to make mistakes without investing a lot of time and energy. Small projects are also much easier to revise, update, and totally rewrite than entire game worlds. (You also feel less bad about not revising and rewriting small projects if you don’t have the time.)You can learn on small projects to prepare for the bigger stuff. I knew very little about what made a good adventure, a balanced game system, or a compelling RPG mechanic when I started World Builder Blog. I learned a lot of those things overtime, and I still learn new stuff on every project (large and small). Small projects give you the building blocks to make larger projects. It’s not just the building blocks of game design either. You’ll learn how art, layout, editing, playtesting, project management, and more come together if you start small. That is not stuff you want to learn on-the-fly as you also deal with the mammoth task of building a brand new game.The RPG community is also more likely to read something from any designer, especially a new one, if it is a small creation. Just reading a full campaign setting or 150,000-word adventure is a big time commitment, and there are already more RPGs in the world than most folks will play in a lifetime, so getting people to play your enormous creations is even harder than getting them to look at it. A person is far more likely to read and use a spell or feat you write than an entirely new game system.After starting small and becoming comfortable making that one element of a game, move on. Push yourself toward places where you are less and less comfortable and need more and more expertise. For instance, if you were to design elements of Dungeons & Dragons, your progression might look something like this (which is a VERY LOOSE road map):

  1. Backgrounds
  2. Magic Items
  3. Spells
  4. Feats
  5. Monsters
  6. Rules Modules for DMs to Use
  7. Races
  8. Subclasses
  9. Classes
  10. Campaign Settings for D&D
  11. Hacks of D&D
  12. Entirely New RPG

Pick a System You Know

It may seem obvious, but if you’re going to start small, that usually involves designing for another system, so pick a system you know well. This should be a system you currently run or play with some frequency and history, and one for which you have read and have access to all the rules. The first reason for this is the most obvious. The better you know the system, the better you understand its nuisances. You have to understand how the rules of a whole game work if you want to add or modify tiny pieces of it. We all know even the smallest rule can be exploited to break the game in ways that were never intended.Designing for a system you know well also helps you understand the correct language to use in your creation. If you don’t use the proper vocabulary for your creation, it won’t play nice with the system’s existing rules. This is a key part of game design. For instance, did you know that there are no skill checks in fifth edition D&D? What some of you are thinking of when you say skill check fits into a much broader category formally called ability checks. That one-word distinction makes a big different.Finally, the better you know the system, the more likely you are to understand what the game is missing that you can create. Before you make something, make sure it’s not already an official part of the game. If it is and you want to remake it anyway, go for it! Just make sure you’re not reinventing the wheel unknowingly, so you can explain the recreation (and differentiate it from the existing rules).

Share Your Creations

Once you creat something, share it! Let friends and family who understand games see it and ask for feedback. Share you stuff on the internet, and ask people what they think. Gamers will not hesitate to give their opinions. Listen to what people have to say. You don’t have to take every piece of feedback or advice, but if you get an overwhelming number of people telling you the laser gun you designed is too powerful, too weak, or too complicated, take a look at the design, and see what you can improve.Sharing your creations with a wider community also helps get your name out there. It can be scary for some to put personal creations out there, and some people can be mean with their criticism (ignore those jerks for sure), but there will be people out there who like your stuff and follow you because of it. I would never have gotten hired by Kobold Press, the Adventurers League, Roll20, or Wizards of the Coast if I hadn’t shared my creations on social and on forums.

Don’t Get Scared

This is a lot of advice I’m giving here, but don’t let it scare you off from creating. If you’re interested in designing games, the only way to do so is to do it. You will make mistakes, which will help you learn. You will get frustrated sometimes, but if this is what you want to do, you owe it to yourself to try. Besides, most of the time it is a lot of freakin’ fun! You can always revise your creations, so have no fear!

Don’t Give Up (or Do So with Pride)

Don’t stop at one small creation. Maybe it didn’t get as much traction as you wanted. That’s ok! Your creation can live on the internet forever, slowly gaining recognition. Maybe it was more difficult to create than you thought. That’s ok too! Like anything, it gets easier with practice. It takes time to build a following and to get good at any task. Don’t give up if you’re not an RPG superstar with 20,000 Twitter followers after a year of work.Of course, it is also ok for you to give game design a try and say, “This is not for me,” then walk away from it. It is ok to love RPGs and not design for them. If you give it a shot and find that you’d rather spend your time and energy elsewhere (perhaps making your own personal games better), then leave game design behind with your head held high for giving it a shot!

What Do the Pros Say?

I am not the only source of game design advice out there (nor am I the best). Here are some of my favorite places to go to hear what the pros have to say about it:

  • Complete Kobold Guide to Game Design from Kobold Press is a series of essays from Wolfgang Baur, Monte Cook, Ed Greenwood, Mike Stackpole, and other industry veterans. It’s got a lot of great advice about frequently asked topics. If you enjoy it, check out the other Kobold Guides.
  • Gnome Stew is an award-winning blog that has a whole category of articles dedicated to making games from incredible authors.
  • Table Top Babble is my own show. Each week I talk to many different folks in the RPG industry, but most often I speak with designers about their games and game design. Here’s Matt Mercer chatting about game design if you need an episode to jump into.
  • Design Doc is a podcast where hosts Hannah and Evan are designing their own RPG episode by episode!
  • Dragon Talk, the official D&D podcast hosted by Greg Tito and Shelly Mazzenoble, has segments called Lore You Should Know with Chris Perkins and Sage Advice with Jeremy Crawford. These segments break down how D&D’s story and mechanics were created and how they work.

Do you have your own places you like to go? Share them in the comments!

If you like what you’re reading please consider supporting me on Patreon, supporting me on Ko-fi, follow me on Twitter, like World Builder Blog on Facebook, check out my podcasts, find my products on the DMs Guild, tell your friends about the blog, and/or leave me a comment and let me know you think. Thanks!

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Gamer to Gamer – Jeremy Crawford

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A new episode of my podcast, Gamer to Gamer, is up on The Tome Show’s website.

I sit down with Jeremy Crawford, one of the lead designers of fifth edition D&D! We talk about Jeremy’s career at Green Ronin and Wizards of the Coast, the campaign world he’s been running since he first started playing, and all things Dungeon Master’s Guide, Jeremy’s latest creation. This podcast was recorded on November 12, 2014.

Links:
The Tome Show’s Facebook Page
The Tiamat Takedown
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